ii
Dedication
Without the wisdom and kindness of an awful lot of people, Mother Nature would
not have become the verdant home for play and thought that it has.
Indeed, I might well have disappeared from USC before I’d put a single seed on a
screen had it not been for the dogged support of Scott Fisher, the IMD Faculty, and
Program Coordinator Adrienne Capirchio. I remain enormously humbled by the loyalty
and commitment they showed me.
Chris Swain’s support was valuable, for without it, the project Mother Nature would
not have found a home as part of USC’s Advanced Game Project. I also owe great thanks
to Chris for his aid in addressing design and production challenges.
It would have been tough for me to undertake a project that demanded so much
software engineering – let alone so much innovation -- without Thai Phan. Were I a fairy
godmother, capable of bestowing Project Leads a blessing in human form, I’d give them a
Thai: hard-working, humble, of perfect disposition to everyone even in the roughest of
times.
Indeed, I owe the whole team of Mother Nature an enormous and grateful thanks
for their willingness to undertake a project that presented such a novel set of challenges and
for having triumphed over so many of them. That team includes: Software Engineers:
Brandon Booth, Bryan Duran, Jorge Garrido, Yixin Geng, Peter Landwehr, David
Mazzocco, Hiral Patel; Concept Artist: Suni Paek; Animators: Joy Han, Kat Bakonyi,
Janet Y. Lee, Max Rubin; Designers: Jimmy Gorham and Sarah Scialli; Composer: